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China Unseats US As Global Investment Leader In Financial Technology: Report (fortune.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the take-your-seat dept.

Paul Fernhout writes: China has unseated North America as the global investment leader in financial technology, or "fintech," according to Citigroup's latest report on "digital disruption." The researchers attribute the power shift to the rise of what they term "Chinese dragons," an industry term for the biggest upstarts in Asia. Think of Ant Financial, the payments spinout of Alibaba, as well as Lu.com, JD Finance, and Qufenqi, emerging eastern juggernauts that are generally less familiar to consumers in the west. China accounted for more than half of all fintech investments globally in the first nine months of last year, the report said. Specifically in terms of venture capital, the country more than doubled its worldwide share of the investment category, rising to 46% of the global total versus just 19% the same period in 2015. The U.S., meanwhile, sunk to 41% of the global total from 56% during the same period in 2015, putting it behind China.

49 of 120 comments (clear)

  1. Own goal! by mspohr · · Score: 5, Informative

    Trump kills TPP, giving China its first big win
    https://www.washingtonpost.com...

    "Economists have warned that many of Trump’s proposals — including suggestions that he would impose blanket double-digit tariffs on goods from Mexico and China — could backfire on the American economy by causing prices to rise or igniting a trade war,"

    A retreat from the TPP now gives Beijing, which has been negotiating its own trade blocs, a chance to fill a void. Since Trump's election, the Philippines, Singapore and Malaysia have shifted toward China's proposed Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, which would also reduce tariffs — without many of the standards put in place by Obama's plan — and redirect Asian trade China's way. Other nations in the region are likely to follow suit.

    --
    I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
    1. Re:Own goal! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      It's what slashdot overwhelming wanted and bitched about incessantly for the last 3 years or so.

    2. Re:Own goal! by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 4, Informative
      EFF Delivers 210,000 Signatures Opposing Trans-Pacific Partnership

      The Case Against Ratifying the Trans Pacific Partnership

      Full Text of Trans-Pacific Partnership Released (Officially, This Time)

    3. Re:Own goal! by Z80a · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You know that TPP was not about america but the mega multinational corporations, right?
      It would contain the SOPA/PIPA shit, an shady tribunal that would allow the mega corporations to sue countries for "loss of potential profits" among other many, many fun things.

    4. Re:Own goal! by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 1

      Looks like they do now

    5. Re:Own goal! by jandersen · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Exactly. China has spent the last several decades making friends in the developing countries in Asia, Africa and South America, before going on the charm offensive in particularly Europe. I work for a global organisation, and have colleagues from Pakistan, who can't stop heaping praise on China, and you can understand why. America, they say, comes in and behave like colonial masters, ordering them about, whereas China help them achieve things they need and which they take pride in - like a big highway from China to Pakistan, apparently, and a large seaport (if I remember correctly). Yes, everybody does understand that this also serves China's interests, but that is sort of obvious, isn't it?

      The point is - China are in a good position to take over from America, not just in APAC, but more or less globally; and probably in a much less threatening way than the US. A few years of Trump will help China enormously - when I talked to my Chinese acquaintances about Trump before the election, they all hoped that he would be elected - and it was not because they thought he will "make America great again". Brexit is another thing that they are quite happy about - it weakens both EU and UK, so they will be more open to making deals with China.

    6. Re:Own goal! by Mashiki · · Score: 2

      This is good in my book. It means that the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia and so on will now get the absolute ass-reaming that the US would have gotten if they signed on with TPP. Any trade deal negotiated in secret from the people should be pissed on and burned at the first opportunity.

      --
      Om, nomnomnom...
    7. Re:Own goal! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Yep, and what does the world see of the USA.... bombs being dropped on other countries, mass shootings, government officials telling us all how the USA has a big stick, how the various LEOs ignore the laws and spy on their own people, how the police seem to shoot and kill with impunity.

      America is looking more and more like a bully trying to force policies that are solely in favour of America on the rest of the world.

      And then you elect a pathological liar to lead your country making it look more and more that the US can not be trusted.

      So of course China looks like a more reasonable option, and no matter how much "alternative truth" gets spewed, China either is or soon will be the worlds biggest economy and as far as international exporters are concerned its also the country with the largest consumer growth potential, making it even MORE important to trade with China.

      The US is a highly protectionist economy, in comparison China is relatively free.

      Asia accounts for 60% of the worlds population, the USA 4%.

      And yes, the US will get caught meddling in the politics of Asian countries as the US tries to sow discord in Asia to try and blunt China's growing influence.

    8. Re:Own goal! by KeensMustard · · Score: 2, Insightful

      By igniting a trade war you mean competing and not just massively importing (defacto not competing and bolstering China's economy)?

      China is not a signatory to the TPP, the whole point of the TPP was to include the US and exclude China, giving the US preferential access into those markets. No deal, then no preferential access.

      Who cares about the Philippines, Singapore and Malaysia markets which are pathetically small for goods that the US would even consider exporting?

      Anybody who wants influence in SE Asia cares about access to those markets and the influence that trade relationships get you. The recent events in the South china sea demonstrates why the Philippines are important strategically.

    9. Re:Own goal! by mspohr · · Score: 1

      Yes.
      Now China gets to assume the leadership role benefiting China rather than the US.
      It was never about what is good for "the little people" but rather which a$$hole gets to be in charge and reaps the profits. China wins.

      --
      I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
    10. Re:Own goal! by mspohr · · Score: 2

      Yes.
      Now the US is shut out of the "benefits" of the TPP and China gains the leadership position.
      The TPP was deeply flawed but the flaws benefited the US greatly. Now they will benefit China.
      Trump's complete lack of understanding of geopolitics and economy has led him to this first (of many) stupid decisions... (how's the wall coming along, bozo)

      --
      I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
    11. Re: Own goal! by PoopJuggler · · Score: 2

      America will continue to decline until we stop. electing. terrible. leaders..

    12. Re:Own goal! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Why do you care so much about US megacorporations "winning" over China megacorporations? These megacorporations are multinational anyway. The TPP is bad.

    13. Re:Own goal! by MightyYar · · Score: 1

      That forward-thinking might be advantageous. If, say, Vietnam ever becomes a regional economic powerhouse, you have already locked in a trade agreement when you were in a strong negotiating position. This comes at a cost, however. Right now, and for the foreseeable future, Vietnam is not much of a market - so you are mostly granting import preferences to Vietnam. That's a slight win for consumers, as prices go down. It's also a loss for the current producers of those goods - some of them might live in your country. Now, on balance and in theory, it's a win. In reality, you just created a sub-group of your population who lost. They will be pretty angry, and probably a lot angrier than the general population is happier with slightly lower prices. Create a big enough trade deal and this sub-group can get really big - big enough to nominate and elect a populist.

      Whoops.

      But aside from that, free trade can really screw up a free market. If you are ideologically aligned with free markets, you can't ignore that free markets require free movement of goods, free movement of capital, and free movement of labor. The TPP largely focused on the first two. 2 out of 3 is not a free market, it is a distorted market that will not produce all of the usual benefits of a free market. They let the magic smoke out.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    14. Re:Own goal! by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      It's not a binary choice. TPP could be reworked into something good instead of abandoned.

      In any case, the other countries are now looking for someone to replace America, and the most likely candidate is China.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    15. Re:Own goal! by argStyopa · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Except, it's a non-fungible choice.

      The US has led the free world for 70+ years, and is taken for granted by its allies and even the neutrals - the US military protects them, so they can spend $ on butter not guns (and then out-compete US industries). The US taxpayer's checkbook funds their social spending so they can complain freely about what a shithole America is.

      We're spending $billions on foreign aid...that we have to BORROW FROM CHINA. That's like taking out a mortgage so you can continue making donations to United Way.

      I've always been an internationalist, moreso than most of my peers but even I recognize that while of course there is enlightened self-interest in foreign aid, we've built a culture of world-addiction to American sacrifice. We're done spending blood and treasure to try to drag some shathole country into the 20th century, to say nothing of the 21st. ISIS is a problem? Yep, maybe fix your own country instead of fleeing to a nicer place. You're overwhelmed with troublesome refugees? Maybe a coast guard or even some semblance of border security is YOUR problem, we're not taking any of them.

      No, I would say instead that a few years of China will help the US enormously

      --
      -Styopa
    16. Re:Own goal! by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

      The TPP was that treaty that was such a Christmas tree of special corporate interests that it was kept secret until the last possible moment. The WaPo represents its big business backers in this issue, while all the major 2016 candidates opposed it.

    17. Re:Own goal! by blind+biker · · Score: 1, Insightful

      And the majority of us still do, apart from a few Soros-funded sockpuppet accounts. Fuck TPP, the entire world (except a few fat cats) is better off without it.

      --
      "The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
    18. Re: Own goal! by orlanz · · Score: 1

      Because of entrenched interests, it's hard enough to get ONE of those things at any time. Getting TWO is extremely rare. I have never heard of all THREE as an initial big step.

      Usually you get one and move on to the other two as the parties' economies adjust and become flexible to the new environment. The benefits of the initial negotiation lead to additional alignments and weaken/remove entrenched interests.

      Yes 3/3 is better than 2/3 but that doesn't make the latter worse than nothing.

    19. Re:Own goal! by dunkelfalke · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You're overwhelmed with troublesome refugees? Maybe a coast guard or even some semblance of border security is YOUR problem, we're not taking any of them.

      Now that really pisses me off. USA has destabilised the region in first place. You break it - you buy it. But instead you insist that they are not your problem.
      That is why I say "fuck you and the horse you rode on in".

      --
      "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
    20. Re: Own goal! by MightyYar · · Score: 1

      It can be worse than nothing because it distorts the free market. If these distortions produce unwanted side effects like high income inequality, low labor force participation, and high dependence on government safety nets then you would have been better off with slightly higher prices at Wal-Mart.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    21. Re:Own goal! by Neuronwelder · · Score: 1

      I heard on the radio. He's theoretically he's going to get rid of TPP. - And he's theoretically going to replace it with something worse. ???

    22. Re:Own goal! by Z80a · · Score: 1

      US != Multinationals.

    23. Re:Own goal! by jandersen · · Score: 1

      Yes, yes, we can always keep going on and on about the same circular nonsense arguments about who started it. Where does it say that we in the West have a God-given right to go to other countries and sort out their problems? That is nothing more than "Might is Right"-thinking, and it is shameful in the first place. But even if we think we should, we really haven't done a very good job of it in the past, and the US have done particularly badly: supporting dictators more often than not, using military or economic force to impose your will on other nations against the will of the populations and so on. And of course, being so bloody arrogant, oozing smug entitlement all over the place. Yeah, it is easy to see why the West in general and the US in particular are so often despised in those countries. It is a matter of how you behave - it is, metaphorically speaking, the way you smile broadly, but it doesn't quite reach the eyes. People see America as insincere: as glib bullies.

      And it breaks my heart, it really does, because all the Americans that I know in person are such nice, generous and sincere people. You guys need to get your government and your big corporations under control.

    24. Re:Own goal! by argStyopa · · Score: 1

      "Yeah, it is easy to see why the West in general and the US in particular are so often despised in those countries. "

      Could it be 70 years of hate-America propaganda promulgated by the ceaseless parade of dictators and crazy-nutter-religious leaders that have inhabited that part of the world since the Ottomans left?

      Could it be because the US *didn't* agree with simply letting the Arabs genocide the Israelis? Crazy, I know!

      --
      -Styopa
    25. Re:Own goal! by argStyopa · · Score: 1

      Please let me know when the Middle East hasn't been an unstable, violent, shithole.

      Our first involvement with the region as a state was when Barbary Pirates captured and enslaved US sailors. One might say that everything after that is karma.

      --
      -Styopa
  2. Tradewar by backslashdot · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We are going to put tariffs on imports? That will not help the economy. It won't help anyone.

    Products will get more expensive for people who have money and incomes today. If we forcefully bring manufacturing jobs back here, it means that workers and business owners have to pay extra for goods due to the salaries of the workers in those jobs.

    I mean, we have 90 million people not working today of which only about 20 million can probably work -- maybe even less. The rest are either too young, students, disabled, or old.

    So we are going to put that 20 million to work, by paying $10 for a screwdriver instead of $5? By paying $300 for a phone that may cost only $200 today?

    From the perspective of an income earner isn't that worse than being taxed and having a portion of the tax go towards welfare for the unemployed?

    The advantage of giving someone welfare over paying them to do unnecessary work is that the person on welfare would have time to learn new skills plus you lose the overhead costs. And yes if someone or something else can do my work more efficiently then my work is by definition unnecessary.

    1. Re:Tradewar by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      We are going to put tariffs on imports? That will not help the economy. It won't help anyone.

      Products will get more expensive for people who have money and incomes today. If we forcefully bring manufacturing jobs back here, it means that workers and business owners have to pay extra for goods due to the salaries of the workers in those jobs.

      I mean, we have 90 million people not working today of which only about 20 million can probably work -- maybe even less. The rest are either too young, students, disabled, or old.

      So we are going to put that 20 million to work, by paying $10 for a screwdriver instead of $5? By paying $300 for a phone that may cost only $200 today?

      From the perspective of an income earner isn't that worse than being taxed and having a portion of the tax go towards welfare for the unemployed?

      The advantage of giving someone welfare over paying them to do unnecessary work is that the person on welfare would have time to learn new skills plus you lose the overhead costs. And yes if someone or something else can do my work more efficiently then my work is by definition unnecessary.

      Putting in place super tariffs will help Trump get elected again in 2020 because the damage will not have been full done by then. Even if his super tariffs and trade wars haven't improved things by the end of this term US voters will be wanting to 'give him a chance' by voting him into office again since he'll blame things on liberals sabotaging his efforts. US voters have always eaten up promises of lowering taxes and deregulation even though it mostly benefits the rich. You can now add blaming foreigners for all the economic woes of the USA to the list of things that US (like European) voters will eat up like rat poison. The rich will run with their tax cut money to Panama, an act made easier because all manner of tax regulations forbidding that will for some strange reason have ended up in the deregulation shredder, there will be no bread crumbs dropping from the tables of the wealthy onto the floor for the common man to eat and I'm pretty sure building a wall along the borders of the USA (or for that matter Europe) and turning the country into a fortress to keep out the foreigners will not help either. The fun only really starts at the end of Trump's second term when he starts trying to repeal the twenty-second amendment 'due to popular demand'.

    2. Re:Tradewar by Solandri · · Score: 1

      The advantage of giving someone welfare over paying them to do unnecessary work is that the person on welfare would have time to learn new skills plus you lose the overhead costs

      Welfare: Give the person the money to live. Whether he takes the time to learn new skills is up to him.

      Subsidized labor: In order to get the money to live, the person is forced to learn new skills to work a job (or use skills s/he already knows).

      I'm actually pro-free trade and globalization. But it's been obvious for over a decade that China has been keeping its labor costs artificially low by manipulating its currency. In other words, the low prices of Chinese-made goods are actually below what the free market says they should cost. This creates an economic inefficiency where work that should be necessary and remain in the U.S. is unnecessarily moved to China to the detriment of the U.S. and benefit of China. (Because it's an inefficiency, the U.S. loses more than China gains.) While I'm generally opposed to tariffs, in this case in moderation they would help restore balance and put the economy back closer to where it should be. (The U.S. gains more than China loses.)

      If the pricing of Chinese-made goods were truly dictated by the free market, then we would be in an ideal economic efficiency state, and what you say would be true. But without China's currency manipulation, most of our offshored manufacturing would've moved to other developing countries or (due to transport costs and lack of sufficient low-labor production overseas) come back to the U.S.

    3. Re:Tradewar by jandersen · · Score: 1

      If we forcefully bring manufacturing jobs back here, it means that workers and business owners have to pay extra for goods due to the salaries of the workers in those jobs.

      Unless those salaries come down, of course. If the choices are that you either accept lower pay or everybody lose their jobs, what do you do? How can you fight that? Maybe there will be more jobs, but there will be less for each worker.

  3. The war is over. Survival now matters by thesupraman · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Yes.. You are addicted to cheap consumer goods.
    Right now that means a proportion of the money you spend hours to China.. And a big lump goes to offshore tax havens for the corps.. But at least their domestic share price goes up..

    However.. Very soon those goods will be designed owned and build by purely Chinese companies. Then much more of what you spend will leave the country.. forever.

    So.. you can either give up on your cheap consumer goods of wave goodbye to your economy.

    It's really that simple. China is already out spending America on r&d. It's people are more success hungry. They have less invested in a nice safe middle class existence. They are going to innovate and produce you in to the dirt.
    In exactly the same way the us did to Europe back in the day.

    Your choices are few and difficult.

    1. Re:The war is over. Survival now matters by backslashdot · · Score: 5, Informative

      No, it won't leave America forever.

      First off, as an aside, we aren't giving the Chinese money for nothing. They are giving us product in return. We keep the benefit of that product forever. Even if it's a toy that helps in child development. The lower cost screwdriver may allow you to live in a better house.

      More importantly, the money isn't gone forever. You seem to believe that we will never be able to offer anything the Chinese would ever want. That's just basically false. They are buying stuff from us like airplanes, construction equipment, entertainment, and high tech stuff. Even though they have 1.3 billion people, they still cannot and never will be able to make *everything* they would ever want. It's basically defeatist to say the Chinese won't want anything we can make. How does Germany have a trade surplus with China? Germans buy nearly as much stuff per capita from China as Americans .. yet they are consistent with a trade surplus with China. That's because Germans have figured out what Chinese want to buy and they are selling to them. China gets a lot of its machinery from Germany. Germany doesn't have tariffs on China and it does robust trade two ways.

    2. Re:The war is over. Survival now matters by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 3, Funny

      We keep the benefit of that product forever.

      Not if it breaks after one use

    3. Re:The war is over. Survival now matters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Yes, you get to keep all the pieces.

    4. Re:The war is over. Survival now matters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      So buy (and pay for) quality, no matter if the product comes from China. Not that it matters - China will be like Japan soon enough. First, lots of simple factories. Then the factories compete, and quality control begins. Build better or go bankrupt. In 30 years, "Chinese" might mean high quality.

    5. Re:The war is over. Survival now matters by monkeyxpress · · Score: 2

      More importantly, the money isn't gone forever.

      The US only needs to send goods and services back the other way to otherwise prevent a trade imbalance that would collapse the USD, making the country unable to afford more goods. But that hasn't happened because the Chinese do not allow their businesses to freely dispose of the USD they get for selling their goods. Instead the USD they hold gets stuck in US treasury bills, real estate and the stock market, which keeps the USD strong against the RMB and allows Chinese mercantilism to continue. Indeed, it is wholely advantageous for the US to exchange printed pieces of paper (treasury bonds) that pay negative rates of interest for all the stuff they consume out of China.

      China is not stupid though. It has used this mercantilism trade to build up its own industrial base and extract western industrial knowledge. If it can successfully transition to a domestic consumption driven economy, it will not need US consumption anymore, and I imagine at that point it will start extracting its funds from the US. That will most certainly fix US unemployment - by making US wages similar to those in developing countries.

      In the end the wealth of your country is determined by the real goods and services it produces, not the various games it can play with other lawyers. It wasn't British political nous that built the empire - that was important, but the underlying base of their power was British industrial might, and the same thing is repeated through history. The US had that after the war, and so ran the world, but in the last few decades it has decided that making banking products is the key to prosperity. I have confidence it will bounce back though - the country still has incredible technological capabilities - but we could have all saved a lot of trouble if people had focused on generating real wealth, rather than fiddling the numbers on a balance sheet.

    6. Re:The war is over. Survival now matters by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      There is another option. Don't compete on cheap consumer goods. Compete on expensive consumer goods and services.

      Services in particular are somewhat immune to being performed overseas. Aside from the language and timezone barriers, it's difficult for someone in India to serve you your morning coffee in New York.

      People don't like to change jobs or re-train in new skills, but it's necessary these days. The manufacturing jobs aren't coming back, certainly not at 1950s wage levels.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    7. Re:The war is over. Survival now matters by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 1

      More importantly, the money isn't gone forever. You seem to believe that we will never be able to offer anything the Chinese would ever want. That's just basically false. They are buying stuff from us like airplanes, construction equipment, entertainment, and high tech stuff.

      Actually, China has their own high tariffs on externally produced goods. The result is a near exclusive use of domestic goods and a much higher inflow of money than outflow from other countries.

      --
      Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
    8. Re:The war is over. Survival now matters by imidan · · Score: 1

      We keep the benefit of that product forever.

      What about products that have no benefit? I was standing in the supermarket checkout line last night, and there was a display of giant foam fingers (more elaborate and sculpted than the ones I've seen before--called Ultimate Hands, apparently). The whole lot of it is completely landfill-ready. There is no conceivable benefit to our society from this junk. How much money do we send to China (and other places) every year in exchange for plastic and other non-recyclable trash that from the moment it's created is destined for a municipal waste transfer station, where we'll mash it up with the rest of our trash and ship it back overseas? What was the point?

    9. Re:The war is over. Survival now matters by backslashdot · · Score: 1

      I'm sure there are a lot of people who could would be entertained by Ultimate Hands. Entertainment increases one's ability to be creative and productive.

  4. Re:Sad to see Trump... by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 1

    And smart people.

  5. Re:Sad to see Trump... by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 1

    I have no desire to be rich. If I did, I would be working. I'll have food though.

  6. Re:To explain... by Freischutz · · Score: 1

    "money can't move in or out of the country without a lot of trouble" - Really? Then why does Vancouver have a housing price bubble due to Chinese investors?

    Just because select groups of wealthy people that have sucked up to the Chinese communist party can move their capital freely does not mean everybody can.

  7. Fat chance. by DrYak · · Score: 3, Interesting

    until we stop. electing. terrible. leaders

    But that in turn is impossible until you fix your asinine political system.

    (Direct democracy ? Mixed parliament ? Multiple turns presidential election ? Openly admit that the president isn't such an important position after all ?)

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
  8. Re: First investment! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    It's not fake, these are alternative facts.

  9. Chinese quality standards. by DrYak · · Score: 1

    They are giving us product in return. We keep the benefit of that product forever.

    At least until its lithium battery spontaneously explodes.
    Because nobody in the quickly formed assembly chain (including the uncle of the neighbour who previously did work on a vaccum cleaner assembly chain. He did a bit of soldering. He should be okay to work on this hoverboard, right ?) did think about putting a battery management chip, or even a simple fuse.
    ("But this hover board costs only 249$ ! The other used to cost 1199$ !!!")

    Even if it's a toy that helps in child development.

    Yup ! The child will be helped a lot ! Specially by the lead poisoning (after the child survives the fire started by the exploding battery) because the toy was painted with the cheapest possible pigment available.
    ("But it was so cheap and affordable !")

    The lower cost screwdriver may allow you to live in a better house.

    In a better *warmed* house.
    Because it got burned down.
    (You can count on china managing to get a simple screwdriver exploding,
    just because they found a way to make its price cheaper than 0.01$ per crate)

    They are buying stuff from us like airplanes, construction equipment, entertainment, and high tech stuff.

    Buying for now.
    Some of which will get disassembled, analysed.
    And cloned/recplicated.

    In a couple of years, they'll be able to locally produce similar products of approximately equivalent built for half the price.

    They'll also be able to produce the same stuff for 1/10th to 1/20th of the price and flood your market with it, but at such a built quality that the stuff won't as much have a MTBF as a "number of seconds between opening the crate, and the stuff breaking down. And catching fire".

    How does Germany have a trade surplus with China?

    Because for some products where quality is critical (foodstuff is an example) some Chinese don't actually even trust the quality of their own merchandise and prefer to import quality from Europe.

    I would guess quality German cars might too be on this list ?
    (Really? China? You think your idea of an electric car that comes nearly free thanks to massive cost reduction and the rest paid by advertisement [mentionned on /. some time ago] is going to work ? I mean, "work *more than a few meters* " ?)

    That's because Germans have figured out what Chinese want to buy and they are selling to them.

    I would guess : quality German engineering ?

    China gets a lot of its machinery from Germany. Germany doesn't have tariffs on China and it does robust trade two ways.

    Having lived a couple of years in Germany, I have the impression that Germany doesn't need tariffs on China. The German people seemed to be over-obsessed with build quality and repairability of anything and regarded some "no-name asian" products with suspicion. In such condition you don't need need a tariff to regulate competition.

    Yup, German are as much obsessed with low prices as other, but they won't compromise as much on build quality as other markets.

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
  10. This is exactly what Slasdot wanted by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 3, Insightful

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

    One major emphasis of the TPP was expanding US copyright and patent "protection" internationally, provisions which large-corporate globalists desperately wanted. All sorts of copyright terms would be extended, generic drugs would be more expensive and harder to get. Go ahead and support Hollywood and Big Pharma now that Trump was the one to kill it. Had Clinton or Sanders been the newly elected president to kill it, we would be hearing from a different set of critics.

  11. Actually, this looks like China playing catchup by Cesare+Ferrari · · Score: 2

    Realistically what is going on here is that china has started investing in this area, as it has massively behind - the US and Europe are miles ahead, and China aren't even on the radar. I'd suggest London is the centre for development, whilst the US provides the hardware expertise. I'm pretty certain i've not worked with any Chinese kit over the years in trading systems, and i'd be surprised if this became common for various reasons (and let's face it, security concerns would be on the list).

  12. I doubt this is good for China by Chalnoth · · Score: 1

    A big part of the cause of the 2007/2008 crash was too much financial innovation (mortgage-backed derivatives, specifically). This may make help China's economy seem to be growing well in the short-term, and will almost certainly make some people rich, but it's very likely to blow up in their faces.